The Cruellest Month Read Free

surrounding the Commons. Like their inhabitants, the homes of Three Pines were sturdy and shaped by their environment. They’d withstood storms and wars, loss and sorrow. And emerging from that was a community of great kindness and compassion.
    Clara loved it. The houses, the shops, the village green, the perennial gardens and even the washboard roads. She loved the fact that Montreal was less than a two-hour drive away, and the American border was just down the road. But more than all of that, she loved the people who now spent this and every Good Friday hiding wooden eggs for children.
    It was a late Easter, near the end of April. They weren’t always so lucky with the elements. At least once the village had awoken on Easter Sunday to find a fresh dumping of heavy spring snow, burying the tender buds and painted eggs. It had often been bitterly cold and the villagers had had to duck into Olivier’s Bistro every now and then for a hot cider or hot chocolate, wrapping trembling and frozen fingers around the warm and welcoming mugs.
    But not today. There was a certain glory about this April day. It was a perfect Good Friday, sunny and warm. The snow had gone, even in the shadows, where it tended to linger. The grass was growing and the trees had a halo of the gentlest green. It was as though the aura of Three Pines had suddenly made itself visible. It was all golden light with shimmering green edges.
    Tulip bulbs were beginning to crack through the earth and soon the village green would be awash with spring flowers, deep blue hyacinths and bluebells and gay bobbing daffodils, snowdrops and fragrant lily of the valley, filling the village with fragrance and delight.
    This Good Friday Three Pines smelled of fresh earth and promise. And maybe a worm or two.
    ‘I don’t care what you say, I won’t go.’
    Clara heard the urgent and vicious whisper. She was crouching again, by the tall grass of the pond. She couldn’t see who it was but she realized they must be just on the other side of the grass. It was a woman’svoice speaking French but in a tone so strained and upset she couldn’t identify her.
    ‘It’s just a séance,’ a man’s voice said.
    ‘It’ll be fun.’ ‘It’s sacrilege, for Christ’s sake. A séance on Good Friday?’
    There was a pause. Clara was feeling uncomfortable. Not about eavesdropping, but her legs were beginning to cramp.
    ‘Come on, Odile. You’re not even religious. What can happen?’
    Odile? thought Clara. The only Odile she knew was Odile Montmagny. And she was –
    The woman hissed again:
    ‘
Each winter’s frostbite and the bug
    That greets the spring will leave its mark,
    As well as sorrow on the mug
    Of infant, youth and patriarch.
’
    Stunned silence fell.
    – a really bad poet, Clara completed her thought.
    Odile had spoken solemnly, as though the words conveyed something other than the talent of the poet.
    ‘I’ll look after you,’ said the man. Clara now knew who he was too. Odile’s boyfriend, Gilles Sandon.
    ‘Why do you really want to go, Gilles?’
    ‘Just for fun.’
    ‘Is it because she’ll be there?’
    There was silence, except for Clara’s screaming legs.
    ‘He’ll be there too, you know,’ Odile pressed.
    ‘Who?’
    ‘You know who. Monsieur Béliveau,’ said Odile. ‘I have a bad feeling about this, Gilles.’
    There was another pause, then Sandon spoke, his voice deep and flat as though making a huge effort to smother any emotion.
    ‘Don’t worry. I won’t kill him.’
    Clara had forgotten all about her legs. Kill Monsieur Béliveau? Who’d even consider such a thing? The old grocer had never even short-changed anyone. What could Gilles Sandon possibly have against him?
    She heard the two walk away and straightening up with some agony Clara stared after them, Odile pear-shaped and waddling slightly, Gilles a huge teddy bear of a man, his signature red beard visible even from behind.
    Clara glanced at her sweaty hands clutching the wooden